I wanted to write a hilarious and awesome April Fool’s day post for you all, until I realized that a) I had no good ideas, and b) there is already an actual film-related news item out there that sounds like a bad April Fool’s Day joke.. And no, I’m not talking about that Three Stooges thing, although that one blows my mind too. Harvey Milk as a Stooge? Really? But no, I’m talking about something a little more personal.

You see, when I was twelve years old, Sherlock Holmes was my god. I’d read all the stories multiple times and loved every bit of them. Years later, I, along with every other female on the planet, fell hard for Jude Law. Fast forward another few years, and I saw Kiss Kiss Bang Bang for the first time. That’s when I first fell for Robert Downey Jr.

Then, some mad scientist (named Guy Ritchie) decided to mix them. Three great things that go…really weirdly together.

Okay. Firstly, you have Robert Downey Jr. as Holmes. While I appreciate the unorthodox casting, he:

1. Looks nothing like Sherlock Holmes.
2. Is not British.

At least he’s got the crippling drug addiction bit down.

And Jude Law as Watson? Uh, I don’t know. He:

1. Looks nothing like Watson.

That’s all I’ve got, but it’s reason enough to be irritated. Watson is a non-character. He is a buffer between Holmes’ blinding intellect and the audience. A cardboard cutout could play Watson, as long as it resembled him. Why cast a highly recognizable, yet almost universally hated, fallen heartthrob - who looks nothing at all like the character? It’s not like he has some special skillset that qualifies him for this job.

I know this is not meant to be a faithful adaptation. I know it’s supposed to be Steampunk Holmes or whatever, and that’s great, I really appreciate the thought, but do we need this? Do we need to take these amazing, legendary stories and turn them into something sleek and sexy and fast-paced for the modern ADD mindset?

/Film’s Peter Sciretta saw the trailer at ShoWest, and had this to say about it:

This is definitely not the Sherlock Holmes you’ve ever seen before. I was surprised at how comical the footage was. It felt a little like the humor of Disney’s Pirates of the Carribbean films. Fans of Ritchie might be interested to know that the director’s stylish cinematography was definitely intact. During a sequence showing the barenuckle pitfight, Holmes’ punches are executed in a slow motion style reminiscent of the video game Fight Night. And while the film isn’t set in modern day, the trailer had a very contemporary in-you-face edit. Of course, I’m not sure if this was just a trailer cut for ShoWest, or if it might be an early version of the actual theatrical trailer. Some people commented on Robert Downey Jr’s accent, which wasn’t too believable, but I’m sure in the context of the movie it won’t really matter.

Ick.

And don’t even get me started on the fact that the poster looks exactly like “Wild, Wild West.”

I still hope to wake up and find out that this whole thing was just an awful, awful fever dream. It’ll be just like “Dallas.” And that is officially the second time I’ve ended an article with a reference to the dream episode of “Dallas.”

I’m on fire.

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